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Talk:Jake-Clare Relationship/@comment-3575890-20131020012811
You know what's funny? I wrote this post literally years ago, and a,though my opinion and view of the Jake character has changed exponentially since then, everything I wrote about them two years ago is still exactly how I feel about them as a pairing to this day: I tried with this ship. I really did. I even wanted to like them, because I knew they’d be shovelled down my throat soon enough. But I couldn’t have foreseen the measure of torture the writers would subject me to with this ship. Now, I can stomach a lot from Cake. Even if their ship name alone is enough to collect in the back of my throat like bile, I can tolerate it. Hell, I can even (though just barely) stomach their makeout scenes, no matter how awkward and robotic they appear to me. But when they start professing their undying love for each other in such a premature stage, my tolerance can only go so far. First off, I really don’t care if he used to throw frogs at her when they were children; that’s hardly a notable basis of a relationship, and the fact of the matter is that outside of their supposed “childhood connection” there really is not much else that justifies the means here. Exclude the fact that Cake barely know each other, but in the short span of time that they have dated, the most we have witnessed from them are make out sessions, which IMO are painfully awkward to watch as is, but that I assume are *supposed* to be steamy enough to distract us from a most critical principle – they have no depth whatsoever. Now that in of itself is fine if you’re talking a typical high school relationship here that isn’t meant to be anything more than what it is. Throughout the majority of Now or Never, Cake were your typical high school couple. They were cutesy and fluffy and casual, and initially that was the only thing I found remotely charming about them. After all, not every relationship is a big overwhelming gamma ray of intensity. It didn’t bother me that they lacked substance because it was clear to me they weren’t built for the long haul, but now? Now it’s like TPTB are trying to pass Cake off as if they’re just that. Don’t push these falsified ideologies on me now, writers. This is a couple that’s dated for one month, have barely (prior to now) appeared to interact outside of a physical context, and once came dangerously close to ending on the grounds of that.. they couldn’t agree on a movie? And now we’re suddenly supposed to believe that Cake are equipped to withstand everything, including the inevitable consequences that their forbidden relationship surely entails. Can the writers please just bring some consistency to their writing of the characters and their relationships? In the blink of an eye, Dave cheated on Alli off screen. Now Cake are somehow hopelessly in love. Why am I not even surprised? First, it was a casual friends with benefits thing, then it somehow graduated to the status of a typical relationship in little over a few hours even THOUGH Jake made it clear he didn’t ‘do relationships’ and now it’s supposedly this epic fairytale romance? Only Cake fail just as hard at emulating a picture perfect romance as they do a realistic relationship with ups and down’s. Now, I get that Jake is supposed to be better for Clare, but only on the principle of that pretty much ANY average guy would do in comparison to Eli right now. Jake is as average as it gets and in that respect he WAS good for her, because before all of the relationship drama bullshit, he was stable and provided her with a sense of security. But now? Now their relationship looks to be angstier than EClare ever was. I ask, what the fuck was the point of bringing in a guy for the purpose of putting Clare in a NORMAL high school relationship, if it has became anything but? Why must Clare’s love life always be subjected to unnecessary melodrama? But another thing. Jake is such a Gary Stu sometimes that it’s unbearable. Even when I liked him this fact about him aggravated me. His very existence revolves around Clare and only Clare. Sure, he appears to have friends now, but who did he really interact with who either wasn’t Clare or Alli (who was merely just a plot device anyway.) Not only does his character seem to not exist at all outside of Clare, but it’s like he’s specifically fabricated to be the ‘perfect’ boyfriend for Clare. And when he does something that proves he ISN’T this picture perfect boyfriend, it doesn’t change a damn thing. Through Clare’s rose colored vision, the sun still shines out of Jake’s ass. In fact, you know what pissed me off the most tonight? Not the writers insulting my intelligence by expecting me, as a viewer, to believe Cake are in love. Nor them using every opportunity to force feed this couple I quite detest to begin with, down my throat every chance they have. It’s not a matter of them spitting on the most copious fanbase this show has, by demeaning the ship that fanbase respectably represents, in order to prop another ship that illogically is shallow by comparison and it’s foundation, flimsy. It’s not about Clare choosing Jake over her best friend. It’s not even the uncharacteristic concept of Clare using Eli to get back at Jake. No, what intensified my hatred for this ship in ten-fold (other than the following above) is this passage right here, and how it was used. “Love is patient, love is kind. Love is not jealous; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not resentful. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. Love never ends.” The most ironic of parts of that passage, is the first line. “Love is patient.” Lol I just can’t. I mean, Clare and Jake were swapping spit from the day they met. They dated for barely one month before they broke up. And ironically, they reunited on just as rushed of pretenses (lawl one episode later) which only further accentuates that everything they are is rushed. But just the fact that the writers had Clare (subtly) recite this to Jake, as if to insinuate that a love of such calibre somehow even remotely applies to them - really fucking pisses me off. Some of you may accuse me of reading too far into things, and perhaps I am, but this just pisses me off beyond measure because that following passage epitomizes the very essence of what love is, and Cake simply is not that. The writers can romanticize them all they want, but they’re not even remotely close to that. Yet they INSIST on shovelling this very idea down our throats. I mean, everything I currently hate about this couple is reflected in this ONE miniscule allusion. It basically tore my hope that Cake was done and over with for good, apart at the seams. I can’t even watch the scene without cringing. It’s just so dreadfully cliche. As for all Jake and Clare have been through together as a couple. I must have missed a time when their struggles consisted of more than just a trivial disagreement over movie preferences. Sure, the merging of their families can be considered a major obstacle that which creates a starcrossed concept, but considering that bomb was dropped on them so early in their relationship, I just can’t buy it as a substantial hardship for them, when I can’t even buy them as a couple in love to begin with. As someone on my dash so eloquently put it already; I could have gotten over my bias enough to accept that Clare and Jake loved each other, if there was in fact concrete evidence to actually SHOW rather than just tell us that Clare and Jake love each other. But instead The actual execution of their relationship is a major miss. They’ve had virtually no development, and yet we’re supposed to believe that in that one month they’ve dated, that they are suddenly in love. The writers can attempt to drill this notion in our heads all they want, but I’m not buying the propaganda. When it comes to love and relationships on this show, they’ve skewered the very essence of that concept to all hell anyway. So yeah. Sorry writers. In your desperate attempts to make me like Cake, you’ve only succeeded in making me hate them more, as well as have made the one character I never thought I could ever have a single grievance towards, unbearable for me to watch. Clare Edwards has become the epitome of pathetic. There are no words to express my annoyance. Two years later, this is still how I feel about this ship. To think at the time I wrote that, I was worried that I would have to stomach Cake throughout the rest of season 11, lmao. The only thing I don't hate about this pairing is the beautiful friendship/siblingship that came out of it.